Original scientific paper
ABOUT THE EUCHARIST AND TOGETHERNESS IN THE CHANGING COURSES OF HISTORY Duration, deepening and adaptations of one constant
Nikola Bižaca
; Catholic Faculty of Theology, University of Split
Abstract
This article deals with the Eucharist as a source of Church
togetherness in the perspective of social and cultural historical
changes the Church is going through. The key-thesis of this text,
the credibility of which the author is trying to show, is: for the
Church community historical changes have always represented
and still represent a challenge and encouragement to reach out,
when talking about the Eucharist, for interpretative deepening and
even for institutional innovations, as on the level of the Eucharistic
theology and spirituality so too on the level of practice, so that
the Eucharist could remain, even in altered circumstances, a
privileged source of Church togetherness. The first part of the text
outlines the relation between the Eucharist and togetherness in
the documents of revelation and tradition. The second part of the
text treats the theological deepening and institutional innovations
in the area of the Eucharist as an answer of Church community to
the challenges of historical changes. In the third and last part the
author analyses the characteristics of the actual change of cultural
paradigm. At it he proposes the biblical-theological category of
“pro-existence” as a core-category, which is able to give a decisive
structure to the comprehension, talk and practice of the Eucharist
in a way adequate to great actual changes of mentality and style
of life, so that the Eucharist remains, today and onwards, a spring
of Christian togetherness and also an inspiring, energy centre of a
comprehensive Eucharistic culture of living.
Keywords
Eucharist; togetherness; pro-existence; redemption; postmodernism; history of Eucharist; fermentum; bishop’s Eucharist
Hrčak ID:
23169
URI
Publication date:
21.3.2007.
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